Typically, pumps are connected to various types of prime movers or driver equipment such as engines and electric motors in order to be driven for pumping of a fluid. Often, these pumps are provided with a gear that is meshed with a gear of the driver equipment. In most cases, these gears of the pump and the driver equipment may not have the capability to selective mesh or un-mesh from each other. Hence, when the pump is rendered inoperable, for e.g. from seizure or failure of a component therein, the driver equipment may continue to inadvertently drive the pump thereby increasing the possibility of abusing the pump.
Numerous systems have been developed in the past to operate the pump in a fail-safe mode or an overload-protection mode. For reference, U.S. Pat. No. 7,331,873 discloses a fail-safe device that can be used to break a rotational coupling between an apparatus, such as a pump, and a drive component, such as a crank shaft of an engine, in the event of the apparatus seizing so that damage to the drive component may be prevented.
However, most of the developed or conventionally known systems allow the gear of the pump to disengage from the driver gear after seizure of the pump instead of allowing the gear to remain in mesh and free-wheel without any connection to the pump shaft. As such, the immediate disengagement of the rotating gears may cause edges of the gears to run past each other and result in damage to the gears.
Therefore, there is a need for a system to overcome the above mentioned shortcomings.